


Yonjuunana

by Xairathan



Series: Distant Feelings [2]
Category: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-21
Updated: 2017-06-21
Packaged: 2018-11-16 21:36:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11261490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xairathan/pseuds/Xairathan
Summary: There was no letter back. There hasn't been for days.





	Yonjuunana

**Author's Note:**

> _Can I dream, can I think, while I'm just so in love with you?_   
>  _That our paths, no, no matter what we choose_   
>  _Won't divide us_   
>  _and leave me leaving you?_   
>  _\- JubyPhonic, Yonjuunana_

There was no letter back. There hasn't been for days. What was first a mistake, something misplaced, has turned into a cold silence between them that can't seem to be shaken. No longer do they talk in the locker rooms; Rei comes, she changes, and she leaves. Asuka wonders if the shake of Rei’s head she’d thought she’d seen was real, or just something imagined to make her feel a little better about herself.

She might have just dreamt it up. She might be trying to rationalize waiting here, seated atop the brick wall in front of the school, the rough rocks cooling under her fingers as the sun’s rays shift away from them. It’s entirely possible that Rei left the school another way- through the back, or slipping out between the traveling packs of other students. Here under the fading sun, the last, dying embers of Asuka’s hope flicker like the shadows of the rustling trees, through which Rei should be appearing any moment now, that smile on her face, the simple touch of her hand enough to warm the whole of Asuka’s body and put a blush on her cheeks.

Rei didn’t look at her in class at all today. Asuka tightens her grasp on her bag, filled with the crumpled balls of letters that she hadn’t seen fit to give to Rei, that fell pathetically short of conveying the emotions swirling in her chest, a vortex of addled thoughts and despair. Even if she’d managed to get those words onto the paper, would she have had it in her to give them to Rei? Asuka believes she would have; she must, anything less would imply she was giving up on Rei, on _them._

A small wisp of a shadow appears on the concrete walkway, approaching where Asuka sits. Asuka hops down from the wall, standing in the center of the gateway. Sucking in a breath, she realizes there’s an aching in her chest that wasn’t there before; she’s been holding her breath at the sight of Rei, or maybe the embers there have fired up and now seek to burn her from the inside out.

“Rei,” Asuka says. She tries to smile, but it comes out weak and uncertain, as genuine as Rei’s feelings for her must have been. That would be the only reason why Rei would suddenly stop speaking to her, right? “Why are you still here so late?”

“You are here late as well.”

“I was waiting for you.”

Here it is, the release of that pressure that’s been building in Asuka’s chest all afternoon. Her already fragile expression begins to crumble; longing shines in her eyes, which for so long have fought back tears in hope of this one moment, and the rest of her will follow soon.

“You should not have,” says Rei. Her words are terse, a scolding and a warning in one. Asuka looks for the softness in her tone that she’s grown to associate with Rei, and there’s none of it. “You should return home, Soryu. I am going home, too.”

“We can walk together, right?” Asuka’s smile widens a little, becoming sickly. “Since we take the same route.”

“We should not.”

“Please.”

It wasn’t an outright denial. Rei didn’t say they couldn’t. They’re close now, nearly face to face, but none of what’s on Asuka’s is mirrored on Rei’s. She is sure of herself, determined only to go home. There is no space for Asuka beside her, not unless Asuka tries to make one for herself.

“I won’t ask for anything else,” Asuka whispers. She’ll keep herself from reaching for Rei’s hand, from meeting her eyes. She won’t think of what it would be like to hold Rei, and to kiss her in front of her apartment building, the last moments of daylight preserved in the memory of it.

“Very well.” Rei steps around Asuka, continuing on her way as if their entire conversation was only a distraction, and now it’s back to normal. Asuka hurries after her, feet pattering unevenly after Rei’s measured steps. This time, rather than being content to wander aimlessly with Asuka, Rei has a destination in mind.

“So, um…” Asuka’s tongue darts out, moistening lips that have gone dry while waiting for Rei to appear. “You were in there an hour at least. Is everything okay?”

“I am fine, Soryu. You should be more concerned with yourself.”

“I just wanted to know how you were doing,” Asuka says. _I just want you to be alright. I just want to make sure you’re happy_.

“There is nothing to be worried about.”

“Yeah. Okay.”

Subdued, Asuka lets Rei move a step ahead of her. It was always like this, she realizes. She’s been trailing after Rei; now that Rei is gone, Asuka knows the path she has to walk, but doesn’t know how she’ll take it. The way, once marked by Rei’s constant presence, has been lost.

It might be because of Rei’s quicker pace, or Asuka’s own desire for this walk not to end, that too soon the buildings that rise before them are ones Asuka recognizes. Rei stops at the corner of the block they usually part at, though she does not look at Asuka. “You have walked me home,” she says. Her soft voice is flat, inflectionless. “You should go.”

“Do you really want me to?”

Rei lifts her head, catching Asuka in her periphery. Nothing that Asuka used to find comforting in those eyes is there. Rei has become someone entirely different; what feelings there may have been between them mean nothing to her, so clearly that Asuka doesn’t have to ask to confirm it.

“Alright,” Asuka says. “I’ll go. Will you let me hug you?”

She’d said she would not ask for anything more. Asuka does not expect Rei to approach her, arms stiff and locked, and it’s even more unexpected when that rigid hug turns inviting as they touch. Rei lays her cheek gingerly on Asuka’s shoulder, close enough for Asuka’s hair to drape across her face, concealing the words whispered to Asuka.

“The Commander knows.”

Asuka’s mouth goes dry again. Rei disentangles herself from Asuka, deliberately, methodically. Her face is a mask as she steps back in the direction of her apartment. “We will not do this again, Soryu,” she says. “You should not wait for me any longer. It will be fruitless.”

“I understand.”

Rei turns and starts to go. Asuka lifts a hand after her, watches Rei disappear through the gap between her fingers. She’d known all along that this was what had to come; there were only ever two ways this could end, with a separation or the defeat of the Angels, and some miraculous desire of Rei’s that would keep them together. Asuka, too eager to accept anyone who wouldn’t toss her aside, needed no other reason to stay with Rei.

Above, the street lamps start flickering on, their buzzing filling the air and the emptiness in Asuka’s mind that her thoughts would normally occupy. She turns and mechanically journeys toward Misato’s apartment, school bag barely hanging from limp fingertips. It’s not until she gets home and has sealed the door of her room behind her that she bothers to consider what’s happened and what must be done: a dismantling of her own expectations, a reconciliation that once again, she’s been abandoned by someone she thought cared.

Asuka opens her bag, flinging its contents at the trash bin in the corner of her room. The crumpled letters from earlier spill out, tumbling into the bin and bouncing around on the floor. The last thing to fall from Asuka’s bag is a single plucked sunflower, its petals long since scattered in the wind. She picks it up, rolls the stem between her fingers. This flower she remembers among all the others; it was the second one Rei had given to her, its stem barely wedged into the slots in her locker, and Asuka had pulled the petals off it one by one as she went home that day. _I’ll tell Rei how I feel about her_ , she’d thought. _No, I wont._

She let the flower decide for her, and it told her to wait. It told her not to take that kiss from Rei’s cheek that she wanted to; it told her to wait, that Rei’s feelings would become clearer soon, and then she could proceed. A moment passes. Asuka drops the stem into the trash and seizes the letters that fell around it on the floor, covering the flower with them and pushing it all down towards the bottom. She’ll do the same with her feelings, too; if she buries them, refuses to acknowledge their presence, then maybe they’ll fade soon enough.

Only, they won’t. Asuka finds her way to the bed as her legs give way, catching herself on it with one arm. She can’t bury memories, or bring herself to forget what the sound of Rei’s laugh was like, how she used to smile when Asuka touched her. Those thoughts will linger, spectres of what could have been. They’ll follow Asuka into her dreams, cutting off her escape, and remind her of the reality that waits for her when she awakes.

* * *

What happened between them those months before, the memories that Asuka holds within her tentatively, afraid that they might break, are beginning to feel more like a dream that has yet to pass over her. Her hand no longer remembers the feel of Rei’s, but Asuka finds herself grasping for it when she wakes in the night, reaching for air, a sound in her throat that never leaves, that might be Rei’s name.

And yet, at night, it’s easier to bear being alone. When they’re in the locker rooms together, the scant distance between them feels more like miles; Asuka will look up, and Rei will be there, her hands looking as soft as Asuka remembers them to be. Or, if she’s unlucky, her eyes will fall upon Rei’s lips: pink, inviting, and Asuka imagines they would be the softest part of her. She would have kissed them slowly, deliberately, holding not only her breath, but all of Rei’s attention. If she was lucky, Rei would kiss her back-

Asuka swings her hand forward. The locker in front of her slams shut, and she startles with a jump. She’d lost herself again, trying to content herself with daydreams that shatter at the first touch of reality upon them. Asuka sneaks a glance across the room. Rei has hung up her plugsuit and is changing back into her uniform, taking special care with the ribbon she’s tying around her neck. Her hands, unlike Asuka’s don’t tremble. They’re as sure as they’ve ever been, unaffected by this separation from Asuka, as if they’d never needed her, and the act of holding her was one done solely for Asuka’s sake.

Asuka grabs her school bag and starts towards the door. It’d been stupid of her, thinking that beyond EVA, there might be a future for her. She’s always been a pilot, different, and no one had ever wanted her for a reason other than that. Her hope that what existed between herself and Rei could be real was misplaced, as all her hopes have been.

Halfway to the door, Asuka feels something brush her hand. Her head snaps up. The fingers on her knuckles don’t register right away, but Rei is closer than before. From her eyes alone, Asuka can tell that she wants to say something that would be better off left unspoken. Nothing Rei can say now, could soothe the parts of her that want to slam her hands into Rei’s lockers and shout at her at the top of her lungs, asking why she’d bothered to let Asuka come close if this was the only way it might end.

“This is over, isn’t it?” Asuka says. Her voice, loud but trembling, nearly drowns out the quiet request of Rei’s that leaves her through lips that barely move.

“Do not leave me.”

Asuka stops dead, her hand still extended towards the door. In the corner of her eye, Rei shuffles away, back towards her locker. She shrinks against it, fiddling with the buttons on her shirt, her apparent burst of courage spent. Behind her, Asuka turns, and that hand shifts toward her. Rei makes no sign that she’ll look away from her locker, that she might take it.

“Rei?” Asuka says. Surely she hadn’t imagined the desperation that crossed Rei’s face in those brief seconds they’d been looking at one another. Of course Rei wouldn’t have wanted this to end, right? “Rei?” she tries again.

The First Child gives Asuka no response, not even the slight shake of her head that Asuka’s certain was not a hallucination, but an attempt at a goodbye that Rei hadn’t been able to say. She’s finished changing, there’s nothing left on her uniform to adjust, but still Rei stands with her back to Asuka. She seems, briefly, invisible to Asuka: that’s not Rei that’s there, but the memory of her, something intangible that will disappear as soon as Asuka stops looking at it.

Slowly, Asuka backs toward the door. She doesn’t take her eyes off Rei. If she doesn’t, maybe Rei will look at her at the last second, or Asuka might wake up and find this to be another dream. She passes backwards over the threshold, door swinging into her field of vision, and Rei is taken from her sight.

The door shuts audibly a second later. Asuka doesn’t bother staring at it, at Rei who she knows would be behind it still. She could open it again, but that would mean finding out what Rei is doing, answering that question of whether Rei misses her or not, and the prospect of finding that this answer isn’t what she’d want keeps Asuka from going back in.

She goes instead to the tram station, where she’ll be ferried back to the city surface. At this time of day, no one is heading back up. Asuka grabs the single seat at the very back of the empty car, a space more than sufficient for herself, or that could fit two growing teenagers, if they squeezed close together.

They used to hold hands here, Asuka thinks. Under the cover of the seats in front of them, she would take Rei’s hands in hers, rub her thumbs along the backs of them, and not let go until they’d stopped at the station in the city. The rides were only several minutes, but they were one of the few things that Asuka had to look forward to: Shinji might be the better pilot, but Asuka was no longer alone.

At least, that used to be true. Gritting her teeth, Asuka bends at the waist. The ache in her chest that she’s denied existed for so long has become too painful to ignore. The tram hisses around her, slowly beginning to pull out of the station. Asuka curls up further, panting, as if her voice might be able to drown out the echoes in the car around her, further evidence that she’s alone. It wouldn’t matter, she tells herself, if Rei was in there with her, too. Rei still wouldn’t look her way. Asuka could be the brightest star in the sky, and all Rei would do would be to sit there, a pale moon reflecting the futile, fervent light being projected towards her.

The car rattles as it travels up the track, jostling Asuka from side to side. Something about the movement of her body, or just the fatigue that plagues it, rattles something loose in her chest. It takes a moment for her to realize what it is; by the time she does, there are too many tears on her face to try and stem the flow, and her sobs drown out the sounds of the tram.


End file.
